Comments by "doveton sturdee" (@dovetonsturdee7033) on "Knowledgia" channel.

  1. Good question. The problem seems to be that the Sealion enthusiasts, with their absolute conviction about what the Luftwaffe 'would have' done, don't actually know anything about the facts, but still, perversely, feel the need to post their nonsense.
    1
  2. I think you will find that he didn't. Clearly, you haven't bothered to 'dig deep' yourself.
    1
  3. Why would Hitler do a deal which would see him dead within five years?
    1
  4. The French First Army did indeed fight very gallantly. The problem is that there were eight French armies in total on the Western Front.
    1
  5. Which Scottish troops were left behind? If you mean 51 Highland Division, they surrendered a week after Dunkirk had ended, on the French Atlantic coast at St. Valery. The had been part of IX Corps of the French 10 Army, and were not near Dunkirk. They were certainly not part of any rearguard. Moreover, half of the division (ArkForce) were successfully evacuated, and the rest might well have been if the commander of IX Corps had not surrendered as a large RN evacuation fleet was preparing to lift the troops out of St. Valery. Try reading 51 Highland Division's website instead of relying on myth. 135,000 Scots soldiers died in WW1, out of 886,000 British casualties on land. 57,000 Scots soldiers died in WW2, out of 384,000 British casualties on land.
    1
  6. No. Dynamo was brilliantly planned by Bertram Ramsay. The American military (and America's allies) were sold out by their President.
    1
  7. 338,226, of which around 120,000 were French.
    1
  8. Would you care to provide evidence of those 'nearly two dozen' peace appeals? I have asked people expressing similar sentiments before, yet they seem curiously unwilling to respond.
    1
  9.  @StevenRhistory  I don't need to do anything, old chap. You are the one making the claim. Now, it seems, you are the one unable to substantiate it. The 'appeal to reason' was actually nothing more than a threat. Effectively, 'surrender or we bomb you.' If came about shortly after Mer-el-Kebir, when it finally dawned on hitler that his gamble that Britain would come to terms, and he had no actual means of invading. The appeal to reason is the only actual statement by hitler that can be substantiated, of course.
    1
  10.  @marcobollo1532  Presumably, you are unaware of the over 120,000 French troops also evacuated at Dunkirk?
    1
  11. If Sealion was really 'not in works' why did the Germans go to a large amount of effort and expense moving troops and barges to France & Belgium in the latter half of 1940?
    1
  12. Perhaps a little reading up on the realities might be of benefit to you.
    1
  13. So, a totally unsubstantiated claim, then?
    1
  14. Indeed, Britain and France did declare war. Germany, however, simply invaded Czechoslovakia, Poland, Denmark, Norway, Luxembourg, The Netherlands, Belgium and, later, the Soviet Union, without the courtesy of a formal declaration of war. Usually, the first the people of the invaded nations knew about it was the arrival of German bombers, tanks, troops, and, later, einsatzgruppen. When did Hitler twice propose a 'peace treaty?' Where might the details be read? Unless, of course, you mean the 'Appeal to Reason' which basically said 'surrender or we bomb you?'' However the world might be now, and it is not the result of WW2 & the Cold War, by the way, would you really suggest that a world which saw the mass extermination of Jews, Slavs, Gypsies, Jehovah's Witnesses, the physically and mentally disabled, and homosexuals, together with the mass deportation of slave labourers from occupied countries, might have been a better one?
    1
  15. How?
    1
  16.  ALAIN TERIEUR  1500 years of 'victory & domination' is irrelevant where 1940 is concerned.
    1
  17.  ALAIN TERIEUR  How is that relevant to anything? If the subject is the collapse of France in 1940, would discussing, for example, the Battle of Marengo serve any purpose at all?
    1
  18.  ALAIN TERIEUR  Perhaps because the subject of the video is :- 'Why didn't France fight to the end in 1940?' If I were to post on a video about the Battle of Midway, I probably wouldn't discuss the Battle of Cape St. Vincent in my reply. Relevance, perhaps?
    1
  19.  ALAIN TERIEUR  So, presumably you would advocate that history should not be studied at all? Or do you simply not wish to know about the parts you don't like?
    1
  20.  ALAIN TERIEUR  If 'The truth is that no one gives a damn anymore' you seem to be desperately determined to contradict this comment, in that you have been posting relentlessly about 1500 years of French military glory, usually followed by a few gratuitous anti- US insults. As Shakespeare expressed it , you really do 'protest too much, methinks.'
    1
  21. Hurrah! The half-wit returns.
    1
  22. So, the British didn't lift 120,000 French troops out of Dunkirk?
    1
  23.  @pierrefraisse8610  Good to see that the old myth is still alive and well. You should visit the British National Archives at Kew, and ask to see WO/106/1613, the file of documents and signals from the time. The British did, initially, assume that French troops would be evacuated aboard French ships, but this was, admittedly, a wrong assumption, as, by 29 May, French ships had only lifted 1,006 men. Indeed, by the time Dynamo ended, this total had only reached around 22,000. When the British became aware of the situation, their vice CIGS, John Dill, sent orders to Vice Admiral, Dover, Bertram Ramsay, with a copy to the senior British officer in Dunkirk, William Tennant, stating that 'The policy of HM Government is that both British & French troops be given equal opportunities for being evacuated in British ships and boats.' The signal may be read in the archives, and that, despite subsequent claims, is actually what happened.
    1
  24.  @pierrefraisse8610  I doubt the people of the France of 1944 would agree with you, as the Americans, British, and Canadians expended large amounts of blood, treasure, and materials to free them from German occupation.
    1
  25.  @pierrefraisse8610  Simply pointing out a fact or two, mon brave. Something you don't seem able to do, I suggest?
    1
  26.  @pierrefraisse8610  Indeed, but the relevance to Dunkirk is tenuous, or, rather, non existent.
    1
  27.  @pierrefraisse8610  I don't realise that you were 'odd.' I won't bother with you again, but hope that you can get help soon.
    1
  28. You mean that the British were forced to evacuated 219,000 British, and 120,000 French, troops, out of Dunkirk after the rest of around 100 divisions of Belgian and French troops had either capitulated or collapsed? Hardly the spirit of Verdun, was it?
    1
  29. Yes, I know. Propaganda intended to disrupt an alliance. The Germans did something similar to British troops in North Africa, suggesting that US troops in Britain were getting quite 'close' to British womenfolk. Base your opinions on propaganda, and you get a rather doubtful idea of history.
    1
  30.  @FWAKWAKKA  Genial Joe Stalin cared so much about human lives that he extinguished millions of them.
    1
  31. She was part of the RN's covering & patrolling forces, but did not participate in the actual evacuation.
    1
  32. So, how does leaving an undefeated Britain in the rear benefit an attack on the Soviet Union, precisely?
    1
  33.  @UpfulWarrior  Hitler was scathing about Kaiser Bill for trying to fight a war on two fronts. Subsequently, just to prove how bad an idea it was, he tried to fight one on three fronts.
    1
  34. Jackass by name, Jackass by nature, I suppose. Although perhaps it might have been better if the British, and Europeans in general, had left large areas of the planet in the mesolithic or neolithic states of development in which they existed when westerners found them.
    1
  35.  @MrJackassz  Where did I say 'All Europeans?' In any case, are you suggesting that spreading learning, science, medicine, technology, and law to Africa, the New World, and Australasia was bad? Would the natives really have been better if they had remained at a mesolithic or neolithic level, and, by and large, died in their late thirties. Oh dear.The romantic and false image of the noble savage!
    1
  36.  @MrJackassz  As Europeans, whether all Europeans, Europeans in general, or selected Europeans were never involved in genocide, then your rather prejudiced comment is irrelevant in any case. Are you sure that the people on whose behalf you pretend to speak would be as delighted as you suggest to spend their lives wandering around as hunter-gatherers and dying well before the age of 40? Do try to grow up.
    1
  37.  @MrJackassz  I*n point of fact, the only country which 'fought' to become independent for Britain was the United States, which consisted almost entirely of settlers from Britain. The others became independent as the British realised that their time of Empire was ending. Indeed, most of these former colonies, subjected in your imagination to genocide and slavery, retain cordial relationships with their former 'oppressors' to this day. 'Im pretty sure if you asked a regular person if they wanted freedom vs a longer life majority of people on earth would pick Freedom.' If you seriously think that,then you need to get out more. 'You are very delusional and stubborn on what you believe is right, is infact wrong.' Really? where delusional ideas are concerned, I am not in your League.
    1
  38.  @MrJackassz  This post is incoherent. Therefoire I intend to ignore it. Nor, indeed, will I waste further time replying to you.
    1
  39. Good luck towing Rhine barges out into the Atlantic using tugs & trawlers, and then landing on Ireland. As for Scandinavia, the same thing applies, with the added problem of getting the barges and troops to Scandinavia in the first place. In both cases, you would not even have the (largely ineffective) support of the Luftwaffe, and you would have had no hope of getting supplies through. In reality, the Germans never managed to produce a credible plan for getting their troops across the Channel.
    1
  40. Yes, we do. Von Rundstedt halted the German armour to prepare it for the second stage of the invasion of France, before the French might stage a second Miracle of the Marne. Goering had already assured Hitler that the surrounded Allied forces could be destroyed by the Luftwaffe, and Hitler was foolish enough to believe him.
    1
  41.  @bobsakamanos4469  Feel free to show where anything I have written is factually inaccurate.
    1
  42.  @bobsakamanos4469  As I wrote earlier, please feel free to attempt to show where any of the facts I have posted are incorrect. Instead of simply posting tedious insults. 'The battle of Britain airwar has already been explained - i.e. a delaying action and seige. The fake invasion purpose was twofold: - staged for Stalin's benefit, having no real chance of success with towed river barges to bring many divisions of artillery, armour, vehicles, etc across. They also hoped that Britain would sue for peace of course given the previous government's lack of stomach.' It seems that you haven't heard of Guilio Douhet & his theories about air power? In a nutshell, that bombing alone would force the target nation to come to terms. Goering was a fan of the idea, as was the British Air Ministry and the American Le May. Only after it was tried was it found to be erroneous. Feel free to explain how air combat over the Home Counties was a siege in any shape or form. The intention was to secure control over the Channel & the South East of England before an invasion might be attempted. I did not, by the way, suggest that an invasion attempt would succeed, given the overwhelming naval supremacy the Royal Navy held in Home Waters, but that does not support the argument that it was simply a ruse. Oh, and whatever 'lack of stomach' previous governments might have shown (I assume by that you refer to their unwillingness to go to war, which was a popular cause in France & Britain) do you really suggest that old adolf really still thought that after Mers el Kebir, which was a clear demonstration of the intent of the Churchill administration, and even led to adolf's 'Last Appeal to Reason' also known as 'surrender or we bomb you.' 'Adolf also expected his US friends to stay neutral.' Really? Then, again, feel free to explain how declaring war on the US after Pearl Harbor, and initiating the second 'Happy Time' was intended to reinforce that expectation.
    1
  43. Actually, IX Corps of the French 10th Army, to which 51st Highland Division was attached, was forming a defensive line along the Somme, and was attacked by the Germans after Dynamo had ended, beginning on 5 June. IX Corps withdrew across France towards Le Havre, and one of 51st's three brigades, 154, was detached to form part of 'Arkforce' intended to keep communications with Le Havre open. Unfortunately, German forces reached the Atlantic coast near St. Valery-en-Caux first, severing these communications. Arkforce was withdrawn through Le Havre, but a large evacuation of the other two brigades, planned by Admiral James for the night of 11-12 June, was prevented by fog, and a second attempt on 12-13 June was abandoned when the commander of IX Corps, General Ihler, surrendered on the morning of 12th, obliging Major-General Fortune to do the same. Some British and French troops (2,137 British & 1,184 French) were lifted from a nearby small port, Veules, but around 6,000 men of 51st HD were captured.
    1
  44. Except, of course, for the fact that von Rundstedt, not Hitler, stopped the armour, for what he believed were sound tactical reasons. Hitler had already been assured by Goering that the elimination of the trapped Allied armies was a job for the Luftwaffe, and chose to believe him.
    1
  45. One wonders why people feel the need to post such nonsense. Aside from the fact that the British didn't 'betray'the French, but evacuated from Dunkirk (taking 120,000 French troops with them) after the Belgian army had capitulated and the French army was in the early stages of collapse, British armour had already been lost at the Battle of Arras, when a counter-attack without much of the promised French support had failed. How would Germany have picked off 'the colonies and relevant resources at will' when the British had the largest navy in the world, and the small German navy had been largely eliminated in the Norwegian campaign?
    1
  46. How exactly would allowing the BEF to escape have convinced the British to come to terms?
    1
  47. But the Soviets had a non aggression pact with Germany in 1940.
    1
  48. Really? What was that then? 'Let us escape, and you will be dead in five years?' Not much of an undertaking, I suggest.
    1
  49. What do you suggest they could have done about Auschwitz?
    1
  50. Von Rundstedt halted the tanks, not Hitler.
    1